I have noticed Richard does have a tendency to make some…odd jokes at times.
That seems a silly reason to hate someone.
They did a house in my town a few years ago. I drove by it each day going to/from work. The house is near a busy intersection and in the morning I was often stopped right in front of the house waiting to make a turn so I was able to watch for a couple of minutes.
I never saw Richard, which makes sense since he would usually be inside the house.
I saw Tommy many times. I saw him doing work when there were no cameras around. He had a crew there, too, of course. He certainly couldn’t do everything himself.
Roger was there a lot and did a lot of work himself.
I don’t think I ever saw Kevin working. I only saw him talking with the homeowners on camera.
I only saw Norm once. He was talking to Kevin on camera.
I was almost on Ask This Old House a few years before that. It was for landscape work. A producer came out to interview me and check out the project. He thought that it would be a good fit for the show so he told me what would happen next. First, Roger would come out to meet me and see the site. Then we would film the episode. Roger and I would do some work on camera. The cameras would go away and Roger’s crew would finish the work. Then Roger and I would admire our handiwork as if we had completed it all ourselves.
In the end I was bumped by a project in the next town over which they liked better.
I don’t think it’s a secret that the guys have crews working with them. They are seen on camera often. As was said before, they are all actual contractors. I hired Matt Foti, who was their tree expert for awhile, and I see their trucks every day. I also see Alan Gallant’s trucks (the show’s electrician for several years) almost every day.
I’ve seen the New Yankee Workshop up close. It’s not in a secluded location as they would have you believe. It’s on a main road in a fairly large town.
BTW, it looks like this year, Richard’s son has been added to the regular ATOH cast as “renewable energy expert.” (I know he’s been on a couple episodes before as a guest contractor, but is apparently now a star! (Well, a PBS star.)) That makes him a third-generation TOH personality, because Richard’s dad was the original plumber on the show.
I’m not a regular viewer of the show, but about five years ago the project house was one block away from my house, so I watched some of that season and walked by that house at least two-three times a week and did my share of gawking.
I frequently saw the ‘star’ carpenter guys there, often actually doing things with saws and hammers and such along with other men, probably part of their teams. OTOH, I never once saw the host guy (I’m horrible at names – he looked like he was early 30’s, with sort of sandy/lightish brown hair) in person, just on the show.
I got hooked on TOH early in the Bob Vila days. Gradually lost interest in the Steve Thomas days. Haven’t watched in a long time.
One thing that bugged me about the show is the “idiot host” motif.
“Gee, Tommy, what’s that you’re holding?”
<Tommy eyeroll>
“Well, Steve, it’s a pipe.”
“What’s it used for?”
“For bashing clueless numbskulls in the head.”
<Thwack>
Hometime had a better format. Dean would talk to the camera and explain what they were doing. OTOH, they had stuff like pretending to be sort of a couple, that this was their house, etc.
But what drove me away is that the show went away from renovation stuff that a typical homeowner might be interested in to wholesale gutting or even building from new. And everything was luxury oriented. If you’re a DIYer, you probably are trying to stick with a modest budget.
Yeah, but the format kinda requires that. They need someone as the stand-in for the audience, to ask the questions the audience would ask, etc.
I always kinda liked their segment where one of the crew would bring in some obscure tool and ask the others what it was, except most of the guesses were too stupid for words. But I did get one of them right, once.
Which was especially weird when they switched out co-hosts with no explanation. I don’t know how many there have been, but at least two.
But it’s my reason. My own opinion. It doesn’t matter if I’m the only one who feels that way. I’m not about to do anything, or encourage anyone else to do anything against him, I’m simply stating that I don’t like him. Nor should it be taken that I believe it’s any sort of timeless statement, fit for Scientology’s vaults.
Or…you have your opinion. I have mine.
Roderick Femm, he may have been kidding around, but I didn’t take it that way.
Exactly. Kevin’s job is to ask stupid questions so that the experts can answer them. He’s very good at it. 
He’s even chastised one of the other guys when they asked him an easy question. He said something like, “Hey, it’s my job to ask the obvious questions.” 
FYI, the Nahm shop that everyone is so jealous/greenly derisive of is not his, it was/is Morash’s.
Something I always wondered is what happened to the cool stuff that Norm Abram built on The New Yankee Workshop. Usually there were two pieces built with one already finished as he built the second one. So did he keep one and Russell Morash got the second or what?
Tell me where, as I would like to make a pilgrimage.
Well, maybe not. People might find that creepy. I have neither the skill nor the space and money for tools required for a workshop like that, but every time I saw it I started salivating. All the lovely, lovely tools.
The workshop was in the lower level of Norm’s home. The steep stairs are visible in some of the New Yankee Workshop episodes.
I have Norm’s book about building the house. He hired Tedd Benson to Timber Frame one section of the home. Tedd has been on This Old House several times. Some of the timber framing is shown on the cover of Norm’s book.
The workshop was in another location before Norm built his house. I’m not sure where.
Required? How? Hometime shows that it works better, IMHO, with a non-clueless host addressing the camera. With multiple pros, the host can set up the bit and turn it over to them to explain what they are doing. Both generally addressing the camera. Don’t see the point of an audience stand-in. Which leads me to …
One reason I don’t watch these shows is that I go to YouTube for advice and help on projects. And of course these are also generally in the format of a knowledgeable person talking to the camera. Once in a great while I see one where there’s the idiot/pro format and I just think “Why are you here? You’re just filling time and space. Go away.”
I’m sure that Norm has a workshop at his house but the New Yankee Workshop used on the show isn’t at his house. It’s a freestanding building at Russell Morash’s house. It’s on private property so you can’t (legally) visit it without an invitation. There are no tours and no public access.
Yeah, no way this is in someone’s house. It’s approximately 936 square feet.
So, I ran into him last night and asked him. Hope I get this right; he said none of the big stars really do much of the work. Tom will do some, apparently; said that Tom is the second best carpenter he’s ever met, and Tom’s brother is the first.
And apparently my friend has been on the show more than we might think. They had to cut a hole in a baseboard for an electrical box; friend did most of the cut, and then someone else came on to finish it. But you could tell that the closeup was his hands because he was wearing a black wristband.
I knew of three, Wikipedia says five. I guess I watched it from 1987-2005; I never saw co-hosts #1 or #5.
Some of that “couple” stuff was a tad icky.